IIT Kanpur's Rs 180-Crore G-SINE School to Turn Research into Startups

India's startup ecosystem got a major institutional boost: IIT Kanpur will set up a Rs 180-crore school for innovation and entrepreneurship at its Noida campus, with a flagship MBA programme in Technology and Entrepreneurship starting in July 2027. The announcement was made in New Delhi on October 14, 2026.

The Gautam School of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (G-SINE) is being funded with a Rs 180-crore commitment from alumnus Rahul Gautam, with a memorandum of understanding signed at the campaign launch. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh launched the initiative as part of IIT Kanpur's 'Greater Than Us' campaign — an audacious US$1 billion (about Rs 9,000 crore) fundraising drive targeted for March 2029.

Where the Rs 9,000 crore goes

The campaign will fund work across seven strategic technology areas: artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, drones, medical technology, sustainability, semiconductors and quantum technologies. Director Manindra Agrawal said nearly half the target — Rs 4,155 crore — has already been committed by alumni, corporate donors, the government and other partners.

Of the total, Rs 5,000 crore is earmarked for infrastructure including research facilities and computing infrastructure, Rs 3,000 crore for talent through scholarships and faculty recruitment, and Rs 1,000 crore for strategic technology initiatives. G-SINE will focus on training entrepreneurs to take lab technologies to market, with its own full-time faculty and degree programmes, alongside a proposed Deep Tech Hub and the institute's Startup Incubation and Innovation Centre (SIIC), which has incubated 571 startups.

"Unless we own the entire technology stack with respect to certain technologies which are of strategic nature, we will be left in a not so good condition when the crunch comes," Agrawal said.